Swimming pool protector



M 22, 1958 w. w. JoNs 2,844

SWIMMING POOL PROTECTOR Filed May 3, 1954 INVEN TOR.

MLL/AM W JONES ATTORNEY United States Patent SWIMMING POOL PROTECTOR William W. Jones, Sherman Oaks, Calif.

Application May 3, 1954, Serial No. 427,050

1 Claim. (Cl. 16026) This invention relates to a protector for swimming pools.

An object of this invention is to provide means, spanning across the top of a swimming pool, that embodies a safety feature for saving children and others from accidental immersion while enabling use of skimmer devices or cleaning pumps.

Another object of the invention is to provide a pool protector that may be embodied within the pool walls and stored therein, while rolled up, for ready extension across the pool top.

The invention also has for its objects to provide such means that are positive in operation, convenient in use, easily installed in a working position and easily disconnected therefrom, economical of manufacture, relatively simple, and of general superiority and serviceability.

The invention also comprises novel details of construc-.

tion and novel combinations and arrangements of parts, which will more fully appear in the course of the following description. However, the drawing merely shows and the following description merely describ s one embodiment of the present invention which is given by way of illustration or example only.

In the drawings, like reference characters designate similar parts in the several views.

Fig. 1 is a top plan view of a swimming pool provided with a protector according to the present invention, the same being shown partly extended across the top of the pool.

Fig. 2 is an enlarged fragmentary cross-sectional view as taken on line 2-2 of Fig. 1'.

Fig. 3 is a further enlarged fragmentary cross-sectional view as taken on line 3-3 of Fig. 1.

Fig. 4 is a broken plan view of the protector to a reduced scale and shown in opened flat condition.

In the drawing, the swimming pool shown has end Walls 5 and 6 and similar side walls 7. Said walls may vary in shape according to variations in the shape of the pool which is here shown in the conventionally rectangular shape.

The present pool protector is provided to span across the opening defined by walls 5, 6 and 7, regardless of the shape thereof. Said protector comprises, generally, a flexible gate member 8, means 9 to store said member when out of use, and means 10 to draw the gate member into position spanning the opening defined by walls 5, 6 and 7.

In order to accommodate the above generally-described protector, the wall 5, near its upper end, is provided with a housing cavity 11 in which the gate storing means 9 is disposed; the wall 6 is provided with a similar cavity 12 to house the gate drawing means 10; and the side walls 7 are each provided with a longitudinal track groove 13 that, by means of a longitudinal slit 14, is in communication with the pool opening. Each cavity 11 and 12, by means of a slit 15, is also in communication with the pool opening.

The gate member preferably comprises two lengths of 2,844,196 Patented Jul-y 22, 1.958

cable or the like 16, that: are connected by arpreferably reticulated pool-spanning part 17. The .cables 16 are somewhat longer than twice the length of' thepool and the reticulated part 17 approximately half as long as the cables, as shown in Fig. 4, wherein said part 17 is at one end of the gate member leaving the cables, at the other end, unconnected.

The storing means 9 is shown as a drum 18 on which the gate member is adapted to be wound as indicated in Fig. 2, and means 19 to rotate said drum 18. The means reducing unit 21 that is interposed between said motor and drum 18. The particular form of drum-rotating means 19 may be varied providing the same is capable of rotating said drum in a direction to windup the gate 8.

The drawing means 10 is similar to the storing means 9 in that the same includes a drum 22 and driving means 23 for said drum similar to the means 19. However, the means 9 and 10 are driven in opposite directions, but only one at a time, so that drum 18 may wind the gate member thereon and thereby open the top of the pool and drum 22 may wind the cables 16 thereon and thereby draw the gate member into pool spanning position.

Said cables 16 are preferably larger in size than slits 14 in side walls 7. Thus, as can be seen from Fig. 3, the cables 16 are retained in their track grooves 13 even when a weight depresses part 17.

While the longitudinal elements of the gate member are preferably flexible so that the same may wind readily on drums 18 and 22, the transverse members may be either flexible or rigid if the pool sides 7 are parallel. If said sides are non-parallel, said transverse members may be elastic to stretch as the cables are drawn apart by nonparallel track grooves 13, or springs may be provided to give stretch.

For a rectangular pool, the drums 18 and 22 may be cylindrical. For pools that are kidney-shaped, for instance, the drums may be conical so that one cable. may be longer than the other as would be required by a kidney shaped pool.

It will be realized that part 17 may be woven, comprised of strips of metal or plastic, or even formed as an impervious sheet of plastic, for instance, to meet the requirements of the invention. Since one drum pays 01f as the other is driven, suitabledrags may be employed to control pay-01f. Also, both drums may be driven simultaneously in the same direction. In such case, the two motors would be of the reversing type.

While I have illustrated and described what I now contemplate to be the best mode of carrying out my invention, the construction is, of course, subject to modification without departing from the spirit and scope of the invention. It is, therefore, not desired to restrict the invention to the particular form of construction illustrated and described, but to cover all modifications that may fall within the scope of the appended claim.

Having thus described the invention, what is claimed and desired to be secured by Letters Patent is:

In a swimming pool having side and end walls, the end walls having transverse pockets therein, power driven drums longitudinally disposed in the transverse pockets in the end walls, the side walls having track grooves connecting the pockets, cables extending from one end pocket to the other and lying in the track grooves and having their ends wound around the drums, each of the grooves including coextensive slits that extent transversely and open into the pool area, the slits being narrower than the thickness of the cables, a pool protector comprising a sheet of flexible material having its edges extending through the narrow slits and secured to the cables, and lying in a horizontal plane across the top of the pool, and.

3 since the depth of the slits is less than the diameter of the cables the protector and any weight thereon will not pull the cables out of the grooves in which they travel.

References Cited in the file of this patent V .UNITED STATES PATENTS 1,238,360 "Surber Aug. 2 8, '1917 r 4, Lacey Jan. 9, 1923 Lundgren July 21, 1925 Benson July 23, 1929 Schueren Mar. 21, 1950 Law Aug. 1, 1950 Lermont Nov. 27, 1951 Kroeger Jan. 1, 1952 

